


speak now

by sassywriterchick



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Blackmail, Canon Divergent, F/M, Wedding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-23
Updated: 2018-10-27
Packaged: 2019-08-06 13:24:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16388531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sassywriterchick/pseuds/sassywriterchick
Summary: Amy remembers the four times he'd played Speak Now in the car and realizes that probably should have been a sign.“Are you telling me you want me to pull a Taylor Swift on your wedding?”Jake grins. “Exactly.”(or amy has to help jake get out a wedding he definitely doesn't want to go through with)





	1. this is the last time i'm asking you this

**Author's Note:**

> okay idk what's happening but here's the first chapter out of ???

1.

 

      Last time Amy checked, you were supposed to look excited when you announce you’re getting married. Considering it’s _Jake_ , she’s also expecting to hear some sort of crass joke about the wedding night or _something._ She doesn’t expect it to come after months of not dating anyone. (Or so she thought, because apparently he _had_ been dating someone after all.)

Instead _,_ he announces it like it’s an after thought. It comes after a report about a missing grandmother returned safely to her family. It’s a mumble that only Charles catches.

      “DID YOU JUST SAY YOU’RE GETTING MARRIED?!”

      At first Amy waits for Jake to dismiss Charles completely. Jake, married? The last time Jake had even mentioned marriage as a concept, it had been a backhand comment to Charles about staying a ‘bachelor forever dude’.

      Then Amy waits for the joke, per usual. A _gotcha._ Even an _April fools_ even though April fools was months ago.

      It doesn’t come. There’s just Jake standing there and smiling a little awkwardly. “Yeah,” he says. “I asked her last night and she said yes.”

      He doesn’t make a joke. He just accepts their congratulations with the same odd smile on his face that he announced the marriage with.

 

2.

 

      When he’d mentioned going on a date a few weeks ago, Amy had brushed it off. What did it matter _now_ anyways? Sure, they’d had the whole awkward thing with Teddy and Sophia but that was in the _past._ He knew that, she knew that.

      At least that’s what she’s been telling herself on repeat as they sit in an empty apartment on a stake out.

      “You’re all twitchy,” Jake says after a pause, looking over at her. Amy really _really_ wishes she had a cigarette right now. Not that she needed one of course, she only needs a cigarette when there’s a stressful situation. She’s not stressed out about Jake getting married to someone else, _nope_. That would be ridiculous.

      “I just really want to catch this guy,” she says, leaning closer to the window. “You know. I mean. That’s why we’re here?”

      “Definitely twitchy.”

      Amy shoots a glare back at him. He’s reclined in a fold up chair they’d brought from their car, popping peanuts into his mouth like that night on the rooftop not so long ago. The only date she’d have with him likely, she reflects on. Not that it matters.

      “So,” Amy says. _Play it casual Santiago._ “When are you bringing your fiancé into the precinct?”

      Jake shrugs. “When she wants to.”

      Her name is _Lisa._ She has red hair and blue eyes and a mega watt smile and Amy doesn’t know this because she most definitely didn’t instagram stalk her yesterday.

      Theoretically if she had looked up anything about Lisa, it was in the name of friendship.

      “Well I’d love to meet her one day,” Amy says. Here’s a secret about Amy Santiago: she’s a terrible liar until it _matters._ Really, she’d rather walk off the nearest rooftop than shake red-haired Lisa’s hand and go to their wedding.

      Jake can’t know that. He holds her eyes for a moment though and Amy feels like they’re playing a game of chicken, each daring the other to say what’s on their mind first.

      In the end neither of them wins, of course, because the perp they’re waiting for shows up.

 

3.

 

      Jake is thirty minutes late. That isn’t necessarily abnormal, he’s usually several minutes late. Amy doesn’t know why she keeps looking up at the clock and then back at the empty desk across from her every five seconds. So frequently that even _Hitchcock_ has made a comment about it.

      (It’s not that she cares that much, okay, she _doesn’t._ )

      He finally stumbles into work, dressed in an unfamiliar Beatles T-shirt and looking like he’s got maybe two hours of sleep in the last six days. In fact, he looks so pitiful that even Captain Holt doesn’t tell him off for being late.

      “Why are you late?” Amy asks, before even considering how that sounds. Jake just flips a dismissive hand at her. She had initially meant for it to sound caring, but since it’s coming from her she’s sure it doesn’t. Sure, she’s a little crazy about timeliness but she’s also a little crazy about taking care of yourself and Jake looks like the _opposite_ of okay.

      Something inside of her is a little satisfied about it, so Lisa wasn’t all _that_ great. (The other part of her was inwardly screaming that it DIDN’T MATTER because her feelings for Jake were IN THE PAST.)

      “Santiago,” Captain Holt says before she can say anything else to Jake, “Could I have a word with you in my office?”

      “Of course,” Amy says.

      She closes the office door tightly behind her. Captain Holt has already sat down and is making his _serious_ face (which granted, isn’t much different from his regular face) and even has his hands clasped in front of him.

      “I asked you to come in here because, quite frankly, I am worried about Peralta.”

      “Peralta?” Amy asks, and glances back. Jake isn’t even remotely trying to eavesdrop on their conversation. He’s just sitting listlessly in his desk chair, spinning a pen (is that _her_ pen?) in his fingers and staring at nothing. Definitely weird.

      “He’s been less of himself since he announced his engagement to this…Lisa.”

      “I noticed,” Amy responds. Too quickly? _Tone it down Santiago._

“Good,” Holt says. “I want you and Peralta to go on an undercover operation to the countryside. We believe that there’s a drug lord bringing drugs from there into the city. I’ve talked to the Sheriff and he would love our help.”

“And what does this have to do with Peralta’s state of mind sir?”

“After discussing the matter with Detective Diaz and Boyle, they agreed that you’d be the one most likely to get Peralta to talk about what’s bothering him.”

Captain Holt looks distinctly uncomfortable discussing his detective’s personal life, and Amy takes this as her cue to leave and brief Jake.

She’s not thinking about how they think that she’s the one Jake will talk to. That doesn’t mean anything in the end, because Rosa is _Rosa_ and Charles can’t keep a secret to save his life.

It doesn’t mean anything, because it can’t.

 

4.

 

      Amy is trying really, really hard to be nice to Jake. Seriously. She even lets him pick the music even though she’s driving _and_ she’s letting him eat Oreos in her car.

      It’s not even that she doesn’t like Taylor Swift really, she does, but at a certain point it was just _too much_.

      It’s the fourth time that does it.

      “Look,” Amy says. “It’s fine if we listen to Taylor Swift, but _Speak Now?_ Four times?”

      Jake gives her a look that Amy decides to label as annoyance instead of disappointment. Because _why_ would he be disappointed?

     

5.

 

            So far, Jake has been acting relatively normal. Sure, they’d listened to an inordinate amount of Taylor Swift but that wasn’t out of the ordinary. He even makes a joke when they get to their hotel room and find only a single king sized bed. (Amy is determinedly not thinking about that, thank you very much).

      What _is_ weird is when Jake whips out Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix from his overnight bag and drops it on the bed like that’s just something Mr. Jake “I’ve only read fifteen books” Peralta _does._

      Amy’s mouth drops open.

      “Is that…Harry Potter?”

      “Yeah, I started reading them because you - er Lisa, loves them so much.”

      “What part are you at?” Amy asks, completely forgetting the mission. Jake grins like that’s the best thing she’s said all day.

      “See for yourself,” he says, and Amy lunges at the book. She flips to the carefully marked page (he’s used a bookmark she notes proudly) and at first is immediately excited to see.

      “Ah, I love this chapter!” She says excitedly, and then notices the highlighted words and letters. “The formation of the DA,” she continues on, trying to keep the same tone and speed. “Harry has such a great speech - “

      First she notices the letter A, M and Y highlighted. Her name. She continues to ramble on about Harry Potter, only half aware she’s doing it. Whenever her words begin to trail off, Jake picks it up and adds his own Harry Potter comment.

 _Amy_ , the message says, _we’re being listened in on. I need to speak to you in private, wait for my signal._

      She looks up at him and nods, once. Jake picks out a small listening device from the collar of his shirt and carefully angles it toward his phone, before pressing play on an audio recording.

      Her own voice warbles out of the phone speaker, talking about Harry Potter. Jakes mimes for her to follow him into the bathroom, and once they’re in there they climb into the bathtub for good measure - as far away from the phone as they can get. She’s closer to Jake than she has been in ages. The shadows under his eyes are more prominent from this angle, standing out harshly in his face.

      “Where did you get that recording of me?”

      “Gina had it under ‘Amy being a nerd’ for blackmail purposes,” Jake says. “I…commandeered it.”

      Amy thinks she should be offended but now is obviously not the time. “What do you mean we’re being listened to?”

      “Lisa is a member of an organized crime family stationed in New York,” Jake hisses. “They want an excuse to be seen going in an out of a police precinct, so they think that marrying their daughter to a cop is the right choice. Of course, I’m lucky enough that they chose _me_. They say that they’ll blow up the precinct if I don’t do what they say. They want a cop on the inside, but apparently dirty cops aren’t easy to come back?”

      Right now is really not the time to be feeling satisfied, but Amy does feel _slightly_ satisfied. So Jake didn’t want to marry Lisa after all.

      “We have to tell Holt,” she says instead.

      “We can’t,” Jake says automatically. “The less people know, the better. I just asked you because I…I need your help. As the _second best_ detective.”

      “Of course I’ll help,” she says, “as the _best_ detective. What do you need me to do?”

      “We need to figure out something to pin on these people, to lock them up,” Jake says. “To get me out of this.”

      Amy remembers the _Speak Now_ in the car and realizes that probably should have been a sign.

      “Are you telling me you want me to pull a Taylor Swift on your wedding?”

      Jake grins. “Exactly.”

 


	2. are we out of the woods yet?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the version of Taylor Swift's out of the woods I listened to for this chapter is her grammy museum version on youtube (it is so beautiful)

6.

 

      They have to leave the bathroom eventually and listen to the last three minutes of Amy’s ‘Harry Potter’ monologue in silence. Amy feels simultaneously like throwing up and giving Jake a hug. Instead she settles for awkwardly folding her arms across her chest and desperately wishing she could kick Lisa all the way to hell.

      After the Harry Potter monologue is done, and Jake says something along the lines of: _well I know how to make you never shut up_ he puts the listening device back into his pocket. Everything is different.

      “Oh whatever,” Amy says. “You know Harry Potter is the best.”

      “It’s pretty good,” Jake scratches the back of his head. The silence between them, miles long and impossible to cross. She wishes they’d spent a bit more time in that bathtub, she wished she’d given him that hug after all.

      “Did you tell Lisa where you were going this weekend?” Amy asks instead. _Is anyone tailing us now?_

      “Yeah,” Jake says.

      Amy nods, “Cool. Cool.”

      They decide to go down to the small hotel restaurant to search for any of the drugs (or men) involved in their real case.

      She’s pretending to monitor the area for drug activity, but all she’s really monitoring is the look on Jake’s face as he looks at her. He looks more like himself than he has ever since his announced this stupid engagement, and Amy likes to think it’s because he isn’t alone anymore.

      Before she can think about it, she gently nudges his foot with her’s under the table and smiles at him. “If there’s anything I can do to help with the wedding, let me know.”

      “Thanks,” Jake says. “I really appreciate it.”

      She ends up catching the waiters slipping an odd amount of salt packets to a customer and the customer subtly eating the salt packets like they were…well. Not salt. It wasn’t exactly a well thought out drug operation, but Amy doesn’t care just now. She knows they could bust the guys right now and go home, but she doesn’t want to head back to Brooklyn just yet. She doesn’t want to drive back into the city and watch Jake slip farther and farther away from her like water through her fingers.

 

 

7.

 

 

      “I can sleep on the floor,” Jake says automatically when they get back to their room.

      “Don’t be ridiculous,” Amy says. “Unless you think… _Lisa_ will mind?” She raises an eyebrow.

      “She might,” Jake says regretfully. “It’s okay. I’m used to sleeping on the floor. Don’t read into that.”

      Instead of taking the floor however, he sprawls next to her on the bed. A small sign of rebellion. She doesn’t question it.

      “How’s the floor?” She asks after a few minutes, for the listener’s benefit.

      “So, _so_ hard,” he says. “Don’t read into that. Doubly?”

      She reaches out carefully, quietly, and grabs his hand. She squeezes it tightly, locking eyes with him. They’ve already turned off the room lights so he’s barely an outline in the darkness. He turns toward her.

      This is not a Jake and Amy thing to do, but she reaches out a hand anyways and touches his cheek. He closes his eyes for one brief second, so quick that it almost feels like it didn’t exist at all. Then he’s turning away from her and she’s facing the opposite direction and _why did these things always happen to them?_

 

8.

 

      By eight P.M the next evening, Amy’s back at her own apartment and wishing that she’d said something else yesterday.

      _Like what?_ Her brain demands. If this was a movie maybe she would have had the courage to kiss Jake Peralta in that bathtub. But was that what she _wanted?_

 _This isn’t a movie,_ she reminds herself sternly. She didn’t like Jake Peralta. Anymore.

      Amy’s a truly terrible liar, even to herself. Instead of preparing herself for bed, she curls up in her fuzziest blanket and turns on the TV to something listless and noise canceling.

      An hour later and her phone buzzes. She frowns. It’s not that Amy _doesn’t_ get notifications (she has friends, okay?) it’s more that it’s a snapchat notification and the only person who snapchats her is her brother Tommy. Who is currently on his honeymoon with his new wife and probably has better things to do than snapchat his younger sister.

      It’s from an unknown account. _Matt Smith._ It’s not a picture but just a message, and she clicks on it - confused until she sees the message.

      _they tried to mirror my phone but jokes on them i have 2._

She knows who it is immediately, and the relief she’s feeling inside is more telling than she wants it to be.

      **Why do you have two phones?**

_i bought another one when i was undercover for the mafia so i could stay in touch w/ my mom. it looks exactly like the other one._

**Smart.**

_so r u rlly gonna help me w/ this thing? u can back out, idk how dangerous it might get._

**Then you’ll be all alone.**

_thx santiago. if you actually manage to get me out of this, i’ll owe you one._

**You’ll just have to admit I’m the best detective.**

She pauses. He doesn’t type for a while, and her heart freezes a little bit. Too much? Eventually though, he sends her another message.

      _i already know that._

Before she can think of what to respond to that, he’s back with another message.

      _lisa’s home._

      She doesn’t cry. Amy Santiago doesn’t cry. Instead she just grabs the nearest pillow and buries her face into it, suppressing any such emotions.

      Okay, so maybe she still has a thing for Jake Peralta.

Which is probably the stupidest thing she’s ever done.

 

9.

 

      The next day at work, Amy arrives feeling like she’s been clubbed over the head with her favorite kind of binder. (Spoiler alert, not the one made for light topics. The heavy binder. With the heavy duty tabs.) She’s clutching a cup of coffee and is barely holding on to the fringes of reality.

      She had a sad moment this morning where she woke up and everything was _normal_. She had expected to get up, go to work, see Jake, have Jake be _normal_ - 

      Of course, then realization slammed into her as if someone had just chucked a brick at her face. Things _weren’t_ normal. They were as far from normal as they could possibly be, really.

      She hadn’t really slept much last night. Instead she began developing a vast system for her investigation into Lisa’s family. Since this wasn’t technically a _work_ investigation (her brain keeps labeling it as personal for some reason) she doesn’t want to bring any of it to the precinct. It would probably set off red flags for whoever was monitoring Jake, and that was the last thing she wanted.

      In-between her second and third cup of coffee: she admits it herself.

      She liked Jake Peralta. It’s ripping off the bandage in her mind, more clearly than when Teddy had voiced it at that god awful double date fiasco.

      She liked Jake Peralta and she would be _damned_ if she let him get married to another woman unless it was what was going to make him most happy.

      Still, she decides to keep this locked away in a tight box in her mind. If she was to admit her feelings for Jake now, it’d put them both in dire circumstances. _Unless,_ she thinks privately, but that’s a thought for another time. A back up plan if one was needed.

      The choice to shut it away turns out to be a wise  one, because there’s a red headed woman leaning against Jake’s desk. It’s Lisa of course, smaller than she had seemed in pictures and somehow more cruel looking. Or maybe that’s just because Amy knows the truth now.

      At the sight of her, the coffee cup tumbles out of Amy’s hands and coffee goes flying everywhere.

      “Oh,” she gasps, kneeling down like she can salvage this mess. The lid rolls away. She looks up to reach for it and suddenly Jake is there, inches away.

      “I have some napkins,” he says. “You know, I actually cleaned out my desk for once.”

      He’s so close that she can see the tiny furrow between his brows that he only gets when something stressful is happening. She accepts the napkins.

      “That’s my Jake, so thoughtful,” a new voice says and a pair of purple fingernails are clenching on Jake’s shoulder and pulling him upright.

      The way she imagined meeting Lisa was not holding a bunch of coffee stained napkins and looking like she’s been run over by a tractor. There’s something calculating in Lisa’s glare as she looks over Amy.

      “You must be detective Santiago,” she says, her voice lingering unpleasantly over Amy’s name. “Jake’s told me so much about you.”

      _She suspects,_ a nagging whisper says at the back of Amy’s mind. She straightens, dropping the napkins in a nearby trash can and holding out her hands.

      “You must be Lisa,” she responds, smiling. When Lisa accepts her hand Amy squeezes it hard enough that the other woman falters. “It’s so _nice_ to meet you.”

 


	3. don't read the last page

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for all the lovely comments!
> 
> (also this is set sometime after that incredibly awkward scene with teddy and Sophia)

10.

 

“Santiago, did you find out what’s going on with Jake?”

Here, Amy thinks, is the true test. Whether or not she can lie to Captain Holt. It’s something she’s tried before (with Christmas presents and birthday presents and other kinds of presents) and failed miserably at. Logically, she knows that Holt could prove useful to getting Jake out of this mess. _Certainly_ it’s what protocol informs her she should be doing.

He would most certainly pass it over to the FBI however, and Amy’s scared that rather than trying to get Jake out of this inopportune marriage, they’ll try to push him deeper into the family as an undercover agent. She thinks Jake must see this too - otherwise why wouldn’t he have gone to Holt for help? She doesn’t think he wants to go undercover again. Undercover as _Lisa’s husband._

Amy wouldn’t let that happen.

“He’s just nervous,” she says instead.

“About the wedding?”

“Yes. About the wedding.”

Holt nods, and Amy takes this as her dismissal. Right as she’s about to reach the door however, he speaks up. “Santiago?”

“Yes?”

“Keep an eye out for him.”

“I always do Captain,” she says.

 

11.

 

Their first step is to get Lisa off Amy’s tail. She can’t think that Amy and Jake are anything but casual friends, or even _less_ than that. She needs to think that Amy knows as much as the other members of the precinct.

She could try and act like Charles, who is immensely hurt that Jake hadn’t told him the intensity of he and Lisa’s relationship before now. Or Rosa, who treated it with the same distance that she did anything else. Gina was basically just acting like she had known this was going to happen all along, Terry was cautiously optimistic that this meant Jake was being ‘serious’ about his future.

Amy isn’t any of those people. She can’t act as if she doesn’t care, because she _does_ care. Nor had she expected Jake to share any intimacies of his relationship with her. She didn’t have the confidence to pull off Gina, and she cared _too much_ to be Terry.

“Okay Santiago,” she tells herself. She’s standing in her bathroom, looking herself right in the eye. She has a terrible habit of lying to herself, and it’s easier to avoid pretending when she’s looking at herself. “Let’s be real here. The first thing you felt when Jake announced his wedding was…jealously.”

Whoever invented _that_ word did a great job, she thinks bitterly. Every single part of it seems as if it’s outwardly mocking her.

“Damn it,” she whispers.

She knows how she’s going to get Lisa off her tail.

 

12.

 

Really, throwing one’s dignity out the window shouldn’t be quite _this_ hard.

“We should go out for drinks to celebrate,” she says.

“Wow,” Gina says. “Don’t get too excited there, Santiago.”

“I’m being serious,” Amy says, trying to make her voice sound more natural (and failing). Whatever. If her plan went perfectly today, the awkwardness she’s displaying right now is perfectly fitting. “Charles and Rosa just solved a _really hard case_!”

“I’ll only go if Jake brings Lisa,” Gina says, barely glancing up from her phone. “I didn’t get a chance to interrogate her the other day.”

 _This is great,_ Amy thought. _This is literally going exactly to plan._

“I don’t know,” Jake says, frowning at her. “Are we sure leaving her alone in a room with Gina, is a good idea?”

“Oh c’mon _bro_ -” Amy says, and immediately regrets it. Since when does she say bro?

“I’d be more worried about leaving her alone with _Amy_ ,” Gina says (probably wisely).If Amy was left alone with Lisa, she’d probably casually push the other woman down a flight of stairs. If there was a flight of stairs nearby.

“I’ll bring her,” Jake says, locking eyes with her. She gives him what she hopes is a reassuring look. She retreats to a corner of the evidence room that the cameras can’t see and types out a quick message to him.

**Trust me.**

She isn’t sure if he’ll be able to check it in time, but hopefully he’ll know what she’s up to anyways. Even more hopefully, he’ll think this entire thing is an act from the get go. It is, isn’t it?

“I am terrible at lying to myself,” she says out loud.

 

13.

 

Amy picks out the dress that Gina had bought for her in a not so subtle attempt to ‘spice up’ Amy’s wardrobe. It’s clingier than anything she ever would have bought for herself, and way too fancy for a night at Shaw’s. Which is what she’s _going_ for. She even puts on a touch of lipstick and eyeliner.

She hadn’t gotten this dressed up on any of her dates with Teddy. _If only this was a date with Jake,_ her traitorous brain whispers at her. Amy squares her shoulders.

Time to go to war.

 

14.

 

“Oh my god,” Gina says when she sees Amy. “Did you actually pick that out yourself?”

Amy self consciously adjusts the end of the dress. “What? Is it too much?”

“I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but you look _hot_.”

“Thanks Gina,” Amy says. “It’s a celebration after all.”

“Our case was worth all this?” Rosa asks in disbelief. Amy orders two shots and downs them in quick succession.

“Of course!” She says loudly. “You know, hard cases and all that.”

That, of course, is when Jake walks in. He’s wearing his usual ensemble of a plaid shirt and a leather jacket. The only thing that’s different is Lisa clinging to his arm, wearing a plain purple sweater and jeans. _Well,_ Amy thinks, boosted by the shots - _at least I’m winning at something._ She’s probably imagining the look on Jake’s face though, as if something’s melting inside of him.

“I didn’t realize that this was a fancy occasion,” Lisa says, eyes lining up with Amy. Amy wants to punch her _so badly._

“Nice to see you here Lisa,” Amy says. “Looking dapper as usual.”

Lisa’s eyes flare up. “Well, nobody told _me_. Jakey?”

Gina chokes from somewhere behind her. _Jakey?_ Dear god, if things couldn’t feel anymore claustrophobic in here.

Jake’s frowning slightly at her. “I didn’t know,” he says finally - too slowly.

“Well I can’t miss an occasion to dress up,” Amy says. She wants another shot but is worried it’ll impair her judgement _too much._ Still, it’ll be better if everyone _thinks_ she’s drunk. She pretends to take another shot and instead slyly dumps the alcohol out on the floor. She’s sure Lisa doesn’t see it, which is what truly matters. The other woman is too busy stroking Jake’s arm and sipping on her beer in what can only be described as _dainty._

Amy’s grandmother had told her once that she needed to be more dainty, and that had led to Amy rereading _Pride and Prejudice_ five times in a row until her mother finally slapped the books out of her hands and said, _is dainty really how you want to live your life?_

Which was not, actually, and was why her Grandmother frowned slightly whenever Amy mentioned her career. Amy didn’t ‘drink’ her next drinks like she was dainty, she threw them back with such an intensity that even Rosa looks concerned.

Then another, and then another - until Gina’s hollering “EIGHT DRINK AMY!” And Amy’s thinking, _let’s have eight drink Amy be an absolute idiot._ It went according to plan, anyways.

She mounts her stool in a wobbly fashion, Charles reaching out to catch her if she fell.

“ATTENTION!” She yells, cupping her hands around her mouth. Jake can’t pretend to be focused on his fiancée anymore, and is looking up at Amy with mounting horror as she turns to him. Lisa is watching Amy with the same expression that a cat watches a mouse.

 _Who’s the mouse now?_ Amy thinks to herself. She’s going to count this next moment as a win. At least, it was easier to tell herself that.

“Pull out your phone and film this,” she says to Gina.

“Gladly,” Gina says, no doubt already thinking of how she can save this to blackmail Amy later. Really, Amy just wants a record

“I HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY!” She shouts. “AND IT’S VERY IMPORTANT!”

“Amy I think you should get off your high stool,” Lisa says. “Jakey, help her.”

Jake stands up like he’s going to catch her and Amy wants _very, very_ badly to let him do that. To just fall down and let him catch her. She has utter faith that he would, they’re _partners_. She knows him inside out.

Instead, she just lets him approach and when he reaches out a hand she bends down and clutches at it tightly. She squeezes his hand three times before letting it go.

“ACTUALLY,” she says, “IT’S ABOUT YOU. You can’t get married to Lisa!”

“What?” Jake asks, face turning pale.

“Yes,” Lisa says. “ _What_?”

“You can’t marry her,” Amy says, slurring her words, “because you’re supposed to _marry me_.”

There is a certain hush in the room and even Rosa is looking immensely awkward.

“Amy,” Jake says.

“I love you,” she tells him, and the worst part is the words fit right in her mouth. It’s what she should have said when he came up to her and said _romantic stylez_ or even when Teddy said _Amy liked you back_ because _like_ was a lie. If she liked him, watching him with Lisa wouldn’t feel like a bit of her was being torn out again and _again_. “I love you, and you love me back. Don’t you?”

There’s an unexpected pain on Jake’s face. She looks down at him and pleads at him with his eyes. _Say it,_ she’s pleading. _Say it._

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry but I’m getting married to Lisa now.”

 _Good job,_ she thinks. _I did it. Got Lisa off my tail. Good job._

It doesn’t feel like a good job. It feels like Rosa pulling her off the stool and Lisa pulling Jake away, away, _away_. It feels like watching him walk out of the bar wrapped up in another woman’s arms. It feels like a truth given away too soon, a truth that was supposed to be a private moment.

“Amy,” Rosa’s saying but Amy is pulling free and stumbling out of the bar. _Good,_ she thinks as the tears slide down her face. _This is good. This will make it more believable._

“Rough night?” The cab driver asks her.

“You have no idea,” Amy says, resting her forehead against the cold window of the car.

 

15.

 

(She gets a snapchat from him later. _sorry,_ he writes. **My plan worked perfectly,** she types back. It feels like a lie every time she says it to herself.)


End file.
